Harlan Police Chief Frank Clark, today (Thursday), issued a statement to thank members of the public for their outpouring of support to the law enforcement community. Chief Clark says “This past year, for us in law enforcement, has been a trying one. The public opinion and respect has dropped drastically for our profession across the Country.”

The Chief went on to say “The officers and staff of the Harlan Police Department would like to take just a minute to say ‘THANK YOU!'”  He said also, “In this smaller town atmosphere, the out-pouring of support shown to us has been overwhelming! The cards of thanks, the goodies dropped-off at our office, and just the simple ‘thank you for what you do’ while we’re out and about in public, has certainly not gone unnoticed by our officers.”

Chief Clark said in closing, “We strive to serve this community with dignity and respect, and your support is greatly appreciated.”

A new analysis concludes Iowans have the second-lowest amount of credit card debt in the country. The new study finds the average American household with credit card debt has racked up more than 16-thousand dollars worth of charges this year. The analysis compared average credit card debt with the median income of each state. It found North Dakotans carried the least amount of credit card debt, followed closely by Iowans.

Experts recommend using 15 percent of your income to pay off credit card debt. According to creditcard.com, the “typical Iowa resident would get out of debt in 13 months” using that formula. The average Iowa household is carrying about 44-hundred dollars in charges on their credit cards.

(Radio Iowa)

Sheriff’s officials in Pottawattamie County say a Deputy dispatched to a business parking lot in Underwood Wednesday afternoon to check on a man sleeping in a car, arrested the subject on drug and alcohol charges. 26-year old Kyle Jordan Lanoha, of Avoca, was arrested at around 3:45-p.m., for Possession of Meth and Marijuana with the Intent to Deliver, OWI/2nd offense, Unlawful Possession of Prescription Drugs, and Possession of Drug Paraphernalia. Following his arrest, authorities seized separate plastic bags containing about 43-ounces of Meth and 2.6-ounces of Marijuana, a pill bottle with different pills, and two syringes. Lanoha was booked into the Pott. County Jail.

And, a man from Carson was arrested Wednesday afternoon at his place of employment in Council Bluffs, when a Pott. County Deputy served civil papers. A records check showed 23-year old Tyler Allan Dittus, of Carson, was wanted on a warrant out of Pottawattamie County for Failure to Appear on a Driving While Revoked charge, and a warrant out of Mills County, for Driving While Barred. Dittus was taken into custody without incident and booked into the Pott. County Jail.

An Iowa State University researcher is part of a team studying online harassment, something almost half of all American internet users have been subjected to in some form. Rey Junco, an I-S-U professor of education and human-computer interaction, says this study is in its early stages and they’re still working to develop a good definition. Junco says, “Certainly, harassment involves someone being targeted and nasty things being directed at them.”

It can include: cyberbullying, racial slurs and sexually-charged comments in multiple venues, from discussion forums and news websites to video games and social media. While some 140-million of us have been harassed online, there’s still much to be learned about the root causes of such harassment, the impact and how best to intervene and prevent it from happening.

“I’m looking at a specific kind of harassment,” Junco says. “I’m looking at the re-sharing of sexually-explicit images that are shared in confidence. I’m just at the beginning stages of looking at some personality factors and some psychological factors that predict harassment.”

Sometimes referred to as “revenge porn,” he’s studying how the re-sharing of such private video or photos can have tremendous personal and social consequences. “First is to get a sense of how often this occurs and the different ways in which it occurs,” Junco says. “For instance, whether people re-share these images when they’re still in a relationship or after they break up, for instance.”

Some people turn to harassment as a weapon as they’re more anonymous online and may be more likely to say something using a keyboard that they wouldn’t say face-to-face. In order to best study the issue, researchers are working to connect with people who have left social media because of harassment. Some schools and news organizations may shut down comment sections or ban access to certain websites due to harassment, which he says may do more harm than good.

(Radio Iowa)

Forest City-based Winnebago Industries is seeing immediate results from its purchase of a company that makes towable recreational vehicles. Winnebago bought   Grand Design Recreational Vehicles in October to be able to offer a product that’s popular among younger buyers. Company president and C-E-O, Michael Happe talked about the impact of the 500-million dollar purchase in a quarterly conference call for investors Wednesday.

“At the end of Q-1 we delivered strong revenue and net income growth, while margins remained steady. Consolidated revenues were 245-point-three million dollars. An increase of  14-point-five percent year-over-year, driven primarily by strong growth in our towables business,” Happe said.

The Grand Designs line made an early impact on the bottom line. “Our top line results benefited from approximately three weeks of Grand Design sales — which contributed 25-point-eight million dollars of revenue,” according to Happe.

He says they also saw improvement in their other lines. “Motorized retail registrations on a unit basis achieved near double-digit growth for the quarter,” Happe said. “And toward the end of the quarter we were encouraged by the material improvement in retail registrations and backlog for the Class A product line.” Happe said they are focused on driving greater and more consistent product quality and customer service. “Gross profit overall for Winnebago Industries was steady for the quarter. However, we are confident that we will realize the increasing benefits from the profitability of the Grand Design line in future quarters,” Happe said.

The  2017 first quarter net income was 11-point-seven million dollars, or 42 cents per diluted share. That’s an increase of 37-point-two percent for the same period last year.

(Radio Iowa)